


I'm Feline Fine

by ernyx



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Cats, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Liho is a good cat, Nat is a cat mom, Natasha Romanov-centric, and a cat savior, chapter 1: gen nat and cats, chapter 2: bucky shows up with a cat, chapter 3: nat misses liho so clint gets her a kitty, chapter 4: a cat runs into bucky so he brings it home to her
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-21 11:13:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13739667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ernyx/pseuds/ernyx
Summary: meme: Drop a kitten on my muse!! (collection of unrelated chapters)--It’s not like Nat asked for a cat. In fact, if anything, she’s done the reverse. She did her absolute best to keep Liho out until having the cat freeze to death became a real possibility, and even then it took a long time for her to properly acknowledge the attachment.So it was only absolutely obvious that she didn’t want *another* cat. And yet, when one went to dart across the road, mewing fearfully, straight into the path of a car, she’d acted completely on instinct and scooped it up, dashing to safety with the little furball in her arms.





	1. Whiner, always making noise and demanding attention (Gen)

**Author's Note:**

> crossposted from tumblr @artificiallyimplantedmemories // feel free to send prompts for me here or there

     It’s not like Nat asked for a cat. In fact, if anything, she’s done the reverse. She did her absolute best to keep Liho out until having the cat  _freeze_  to death became a real possibility, and even  _then_  it took a long time for her to properly acknowledge the attachment.

     So it was only absolutely obvious that she didn’t want  _another_  cat.

     And yet, when one went to dart across the road, mewing fearfully, straight into the path of a car, she’d acted completely on instinct and scooped it up, dashing to safety with the little furball in her arms. It was grimy, its fuzz matted and untamed, and there was no collar. With a sigh, she brought it to a vet, who confirmed that there was also no microchip, though it had been spayed at some point, which meant it also had its vaccines and everything else. The local shelter was closed for the night, the vet explained, though she could come back in the morning if she wanted to rid herself of the kitten.

     Almost exasperated with herself, she took the cardboard carrier and the mewling kitty with her, dropping it straight into the bathroom sink first to clean it up. If it was staying the night, it wasn’t going to stink up her apartment.

     And then it happened. Liho walked in, and instead of hissing, planted herself right into the sink with the other kitten. Normally it was a hassle and a half (full of claws and bleeding arms) to get the cat to even take a bath. This was… unprecedented.

     The meowing stuttered off, slowly turning into purrs as the warm water sluiced away the grit and muck, revealing a beautiful gray kitty. Liho purred in return, nudging it gently, and licking at its face. They were both toweled up, and deposited into Liho’s cat bed, which the larger black cat apparently decided was shareable for the night, because she curled right around the kitten and went to sleep. The little thing followed her into dreamland soon after, and Nat breathed a sigh of relief.

     In the morning, Nat got the cardboard crate out again and dropped the kitten into it, only for it to start yowling mercilessly. She tried to shush it, if only because it sounded like there was a murder taking place in there, only to have Liho start up too– and Liho had never _ever_ yowled in front of Natasha before. The shock of it made Natasha set the makeshift carrier down abruptly, which only caused the nameless kitten to yowl harder, and threw up her hands in despair.

     “Fine,  **fine!**  Keep your damned little cat. But  _you_  better be the one to keep it occupied, you hear? And I’m not going to tolerate it peeing on my floor.”

     She tipped the box back over so the kitten could crawl out to Liho, flopping on the couch. The cats stared at her silently, reunited, and she got the feeling that they were judging her hardcore. With a huff, she pulled out her phone and texted Clint.

      _[sms]_ do you think they make diapers for kittens?


	2. Giant jackass cat, no love unless treat, don’t pet (ft. Bucky)

     Natasha isn’t sure what prompts Bucky to show up with a  _cat,_ but she’s not about to turn him–  _them_ – away from her doorstep, so she lets them in hesitantly. It’s only then that she sees that the thing has been unsuccessfully trying to gouge out chunks from Bucky’s metal arm, and as soon as he puts it down, it zips across the room and is halfway up her curtains. She winces at the pulled threads from the claws, but just sighs and pulls out a chair for the man before going to make some coffee.

     She’s barely got the water into the coffee maker when the little thing comes zipping through the kitchen and promptly gets stuck in the towel hanging from the handle of the oven.

     “Where the hell did you find this little menace?” she asks, loud enough for Bucky to hear from the other room, as she attempts to disentangle the little claws from the loops of cotton on the fabric. It spits and hisses like it’s a fifteen pound cobra instead of a five pound ball of fluff, and as soon as it’s freed, it runs out of the room again.

     Natasha has just finally gotten the coffee into the filter and started the brew when she hears the yelp of pain from the other room. She rushes over, only to find Bucky attempting to disengage his fingers… from the kitten’s teeth.

     “Really? You tried to  _pet_  it?” She says in a voice that says she clearly thinks he’s an idiot in this particular area, and instead grabs a cat treat from the cabinet and dangles it in front of the fuzzball. It immediately latches on to that instead, purring loudly in between chomping noises, and Nat can’t help but smile fondly. “Well, I suppose I can’t blame you too much. She’s just like me.”


	3. Whiner, always making noise and demanding attention (ft. Clint)

    Natasha likes cats. Well, she likes dogs too (which she clarifies only because some people think these are mutually exclusive choices), but she  _specifically_  likes cats because they’re independent and clean and generally sleek creatures. They’re products of their own domestication, to a large extent, and know how to get what they want when they want it. You can leave them alone for a few days without trouble because they take care of themselves, and while they’re happy to interact with you more often than not, they do it on their terms, and that makes them feel more human than most other pets, in Natasha’s opinion.

     Nat says as much to Clint, pretty early on in their association, after that one time that he finds her half-laying on a sidewalk, petting a stray kitten. It’s not her most dignified moment.

     Once all the chaos of their Avengers lifestyle fades into something more manageable, there’s even some level of pet domesticity that the duo achieve. Clint brings home an injured dog and nurses him back to health, one that has the good sense not to slobber on Natasha or her things, while having no such compunctions about Clint’s stuff, and Nat ends up fostering a little black cat that would freeze outside in the winter. When the spring comes again, it’s all too happy to take its leave, and Nat tries not to mourn its loss.

     Clint knows better, though– because he  _always_  knows– because he has some sort of superpower when it comes to reading Natasha that really stems from years and years of being her lover, then her best friend, and then both. He knows better when she says she’s better off without the attachment, because heck, she tried to pull the same line on him not so long ago.

     It’s well into summer when Clint comes in with a box in his arms. Carefully, he extricates a tiny kitten from it and places it in Nat’s befuddled lap. She stares.

     “What… is this?”  
     “I would have thought that was obvious. It’s a cat.”  
     “Yes. But why?”  
     “Because you miss Liho.”  
     “I don’t–”  
     “Yeah you do. Don’t lie to me.”

     She’s defenseless in the face of that, because she  _does_  try not to lie to him if possible, it’s one of the earliest promises she made in their friendship, even before they became romantically involved. She settles for running two fingers down its back, marveling at how tiny the little cat is. It instantly starts meowing up a storm.

     “It, uh, didn’t do that in the shelter,” Clint says almost defensively, pre-empting an accusation of saddling her with a needy creature.

     “Of course it didn’t. It was used to being ignored there.” Something in her tone shifts as Natasha wonders if she was ever this desperate for attention. Her eyes flick to the archer, wondering the same about him. Probably. They both know what it’s like to be young and alone. Whether they were allowed to express it or not is a different matter.

     The meows continue for a while, starting up again every moment that her hand drifts to something else, or she gets distracted from petting her new kitten, and eventually she hands it over to Clint so that she can at least make them dinner and get some food for the little critter. Lucky comes over to make friends too, and when they’re sure that it won’t get stepped on by the huge dog, they relinquish the kitten into his care instead.

     After dinner, they find the dog and the cat curled up and asleep, and take it as their cue to do the same. They crawl into bed, and Natasha wonders for a moment at the tired but warm feeling in her core. She slips her arms around Clint and kisses his temple.

     “Thank you,” she murmurs, but he’s already fast asleep. Closing her eyes, she follows.


	4. Little wobbly but lovey, can’t walk in a straight line and runs into everything (ft. Bucky)

     When Natasha returns from her latest mission, she’s so tired she’s seeing double. She doesn’t even make it to the bedroom before she collapses from sheer exhaustion, toeing off her socks in the hall. Her jacket falls to the floor, and she fuzzily disarms herself before dropping all of her weapons next to the couch, where she flops for the next five hours without a sound.

     When Bucky gets in, he takes a look at the mess, shakes his head, and puts things to rights, but not until after he gets a blanket over her. When she looks comfortable enough, he goes back out to get some decent groceries for the first time in two weeks… only to have a little fuzzball run straight into his legs.

     Run is the wrong word, actually. If anything, it wobbles a little precariously, though at sufficiently high speed that it falls over and stares up at the man like he’s a personal affront to its entire life. Bucky immediately coos at it, scooping it up to get a better look at the fluffy little kitty. Despite its stature, at makes a swipe at Bucky’s face, which he ducks away from expertly, before getting completely and utterly distracted by the big shiny thing that’s attached to the man. Suddenly, Bucky is no longer offensive, but the holy grail itself.  _What is that thing? It’s so pretty…_

     Bucky sighs as the cat becomes completely entranced by its reflection, pawing at the surface of his arm in delight and purring away, and can’t help but smile. That’s basically the opposite reaction of what most people have to this particular fixture, and it’s a refreshing change. Carefully, he walks around, kitten in arms, trying to see if there’s a mother cat around, or even someone looking for a cat. There’s no collar, no ID. He’ll have to find out if there’s a microchip on it somewhere. Unsuccessful, he returns home.

     Natasha is just waking as she enters, and she blinks multiple times at him as he comes over to give her a kiss. Seated on the couch, she has to tilt her head up and stretch while he leans down, and the angle gives the little kitten perfect opportunity… to jump right down her shirt.

     She pulls away with a yelp, not expecting the intrusion, and comes up a moment later, holding the cat by the scruff of the neck. Bucky laughs.

     “Straight for the boobs, huh? A cat after my own heart.”

     Nat rolls her eyes, resting the cat on her other arm to inspect it, and her mouth makes a surprised little ‘o’ when it starts up purring again right away. What a good cat. She melts a little, putting it down on her lap, and smiles up at Bucky when it immediately cuddles into the space and starts kneading at her leg.

     “You know we can’t keep this, right? We’ve got missions, and I’m no cat mom.”  
     “We could take maternity leave?”  
     “James…”  
     “No, I know, I know, but I couldn’t leave it out there.”  
     “Fine. We’ll take it to the vet, see if it belongs to someone.”

     Bucky’s face falls just a bit, and Nat drags him down onto the couch next to her, leaning into his side. He gets attached so easily, and sometimes Nat doesn’t know how they’ve ended up such opposite personalities. Even then, she can admit to herself that the kitten is more than a little endearing. If it wasn’t for their lifestyle, she’d be willing to keep it.

     “Tomorrow?” he asks quietly, lulled by the purring.  
     “Tomorrow,” she agrees, and pets the cat for as long as she still can.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments? Feedback? I'd love to hear it! Drop me a line either here or on my tumblr (artificiallyimplantedmemories) !


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